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I wasn't really sure why SpaceX decided to launch when they knew that recovering the first stage would be almost impossible when the waves in the Atlantic were

I wasn't really sure why SpaceX decided to launch when they knew that recovering the first stage would be almost impossible when the waves in the Atlantic were 20' high. I guess recovery of the stage was the tertiary reason for the launch (after the payload for the ISS and for the cubesats), however was it critical to launch at that point or could they have waited a few more days for the weather to improve? One thought which had occurred to me was maybe they needed to get people working on the upcoming Orbcomm OG2 launch which is currently scheduled for May. When you think about all the time and energy which goes into fabricating the rocket along with all nine Merlin engines, it really hits home how significant of an achievement making reusable rockets will be when SpaceX pulls it off. You have to think that at some point in the not-too-distant future it would be absolutely crazy to launch a rocket where you knew you were going to lose the first stage.

ceejayoz 12y ago
SpaceX is getting free testing out of commercial payloads. That's already a huge boon - asking the commercial flights to delay their stuff so SpaceX can test better is pushing it a bit.
- Patrick_Devine 12y ago
  The flight was already delayed 10 times (April 6 2013, Sept. 30 2013, Nov. 11 2013, Dec. 9 2013, Jan. 15, Feb. 11, Feb. 22, March 1, March 16 and March 3) and scrubbed once. Given the importance of demonstrating a fundamentally new capability and potentially saving millions of dollars might be worth delaying for another couple of days. If NASA was willing to wait over a year for launch, presumably they'd be willing to wait a little bit longer. They've been tremendously helpful and supportive of SpaceX up to this point.
  - mikeash 12y ago
    Even if NASA was fine with it, their other customers may not be. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. They have managed to build a system where the customers basically pay them to test new products. That's a fantastic situation! They don't want to even hint at something that might cause the next customer to say, "We want to make sure you're focused on our mission, so kindly leave the landing legs in your factory for this one, thanks."
- Patrick_Devine 12y ago
  Another way to look at it though is the customer gets really, really cheap access to space (in this case, cheaper than anyone else including Orbital Sciences), but has to put up with some amount of tinkering. I guess there's only so much that any organization is willing to bear. Regardless, I'm really glad that the mission went off mostly without a hitch. I can't wait to see when SpaceX glues all of the pieces together and has a truly reusable rocket platform.
  - XorNot 12y ago
    I'll be more interested at the moment to see how recovered engines perform in "reused" state testing. Even the breakdown on the cost of refurbishment would be big news.
Crito 12y ago
From what I understand, they had a window on Friday, a fallback window on Saturday. If they missed the Saturday launch, then the mission would go to Orbital. Maybe they technically could have waited until Saturday, but there is no way they would scrap one of their windows for a tertiary objective.
lutorm 12y ago
In the post-launch press conference, NASA made it clear that ISS scheduling is tight, with a lot of traffic (Dragon, Cygnus, Soyuz) and onboard activities, and rescheduling was not going to be easy.
- cdash 12y ago
  Yeah, this launch has been delayed and rescheduled over and over again for various reasons. Too many to count actually, the customer (NASA) will always be the primary concern and they did not even have to allow Spacex to run these tests while transporting their cargo.
ChuckMcM 12y ago
Because recovering the first stage was not what they were being paid for. They are paid to move stuff to the Space Station. That said, the ability to 'tag along' additional testing without jeopardizing the main mission is a huge win for SpaceX. The cost of the launch (about $100M according to their web site) is paid for by the contract. Getting flight test data as well is pretty priceless. Finally, even if the seas were calm it would be unlikely they would put a ship in the area as it would put people at risk of having a chunk of rocket and fuel crashing into them. They might have gotten better video though. If I were there I would have tried to figure out how to borrow a predator drone to have it loitering right there to film the arrival.

ceejayoz 12y ago

SpaceX is getting free testing out of commercial payloads. That's already a huge boon - asking the commercial flights to delay their stuff so SpaceX can test better is pushing it a bit.

Patrick_Devine 12y ago
The flight was already delayed 10 times (April 6 2013, Sept. 30 2013, Nov. 11 2013, Dec. 9 2013, Jan. 15, Feb. 11, Feb. 22, March 1, March 16 and March 3) and scrubbed once. Given the importance of demonstrating a fundamentally new capability and potentially saving millions of dollars might be worth delaying for another couple of days. If NASA was willing to wait over a year for launch, presumably they'd be willing to wait a little bit longer. They've been tremendously helpful and supportive of SpaceX up to this point.
- mikeash 12y ago
  Even if NASA was fine with it, their other customers may not be. Don't look a gift horse in the mouth. They have managed to build a system where the customers basically pay them to test new products. That's a fantastic situation! They don't want to even hint at something that might cause the next customer to say, "We want to make sure you're focused on our mission, so kindly leave the landing legs in your factory for this one, thanks."
Patrick_Devine 12y ago
Another way to look at it though is the customer gets really, really cheap access to space (in this case, cheaper than anyone else including Orbital Sciences), but has to put up with some amount of tinkering. I guess there's only so much that any organization is willing to bear. Regardless, I'm really glad that the mission went off mostly without a hitch. I can't wait to see when SpaceX glues all of the pieces together and has a truly reusable rocket platform.
- XorNot 12y ago
  I'll be more interested at the moment to see how recovered engines perform in "reused" state testing. Even the breakdown on the cost of refurbishment would be big news.

Crito 12y ago

From what I understand, they had a window on Friday, a fallback window on Saturday. If they missed the Saturday launch, then the mission would go to Orbital. Maybe they technically could have waited until Saturday, but there is no way they would scrap one of their windows for a tertiary objective.

lutorm 12y ago

In the post-launch press conference, NASA made it clear that ISS scheduling is tight, with a lot of traffic (Dragon, Cygnus, Soyuz) and onboard activities, and rescheduling was not going to be easy.

cdash 12y ago
Yeah, this launch has been delayed and rescheduled over and over again for various reasons. Too many to count actually, the customer (NASA) will always be the primary concern and they did not even have to allow Spacex to run these tests while transporting their cargo.

ChuckMcM 12y ago

Because recovering the first stage was not what they were being paid for. They are paid to move stuff to the Space Station. That said, the ability to 'tag along' additional testing without jeopardizing the main mission is a huge win for SpaceX. The cost of the launch (about $100M according to their web site) is paid for by the contract. Getting flight test data as well is pretty priceless. Finally, even if the seas were calm it would be unlikely they would put a ship in the area as it would put people at risk of having a chunk of rocket and fuel crashing into them. They might have gotten better video though. If I were there I would have tried to figure out how to borrow a predator drone to have it loitering right there to film the arrival.